Advanced Combat Logging Without the Headaches

Every analysis in every other guide assumes one thing: that the log is clean. A surprising number of reports are quietly broken before anyone opens them, because of a setting that was never turned on or a habit nobody questioned. This guide covers how to produce a log that is actually worth reading. None of it is hard; it is just rarely explained.

Advanced Combat Logging must be on

There is a setting in the game's network options called Advanced Combat Logging. With it off, the log omits a large amount of detail — accurate resource tracking, certain aura and attribution data, and the granularity many analyzers depend on. With it on, the log is dramatically richer. This single checkbox is the difference between a report that can answer "why" and one that can only show "what." Turn it on once and forget about it; it is the most important logging setting in the game and the most commonly left off.

Live logging vs. manual upload

You can record a combat log to disk and upload it after the raid, or use the Warcraftlogs companion client to live-log, streaming segments as the night progresses. Live logging has two real advantages: the report is available immediately for mid-raid review, and it sidesteps the most common manual mistake, which is forgetting to start the log at all. Manual logging gives you more control over what gets uploaded. Either works; the failure mode is not picking one and sticking to it, so the log either does not exist or starts halfway through the night.

Segmentation: one report per night, per content type

A report is a container of fights. The convention that keeps logs readable is one report per raid night, kept to a single content type. Do not mix a Mythic raid, an alt Heroic clear, and a few M+ keys into one giant report — it makes the fight list a mess and pollutes your rankings. Start a fresh log when you switch content. Clean segmentation is the difference between a report a guild officer can review in two minutes and one nobody bothers to open.

Visibility and privacy

Reports have a visibility setting: public, unlisted, or private. This is a real decision, not a default to ignore. Public logs feed the global rankings and let tools and recruiters see your performance. Unlisted logs are shareable by link but not indexed. Private logs are for internal review only and do not contribute to rankings. If you care about parses and leaderboards, the log must be public — a private log simply does not exist as far as the ranking population is concerned. If you are progressing and do not want strategies or rough early pulls visible, unlisted during prog and public on kill is a common compromise.

The pre-raid checklist

Before the first pull: Advanced Combat Logging confirmed on, logging actually started (live client connected or the in-game command issued), the report set to the visibility you actually want, and a fresh report for tonight rather than appending to an old one. Ten seconds of checking prevents the single most demoralizing logging outcome — a great raid night with no usable record of it.

For the everyday errors that slip past even a correct setup, read Common Logging Mistakes That Ruin Your History. If you are new to logging entirely, start with the Combat Logging basics guide.